Track Your Fitness Today

Have you ever wanted to know how many calories you burnt in a day or how many kilometres you walked, especially when you don’t have your phone on you all the time?

Thanks to a massive trend shift, people are taking their health more seriously these days, and recognising this fact, more tech companies are developing products to help consumers along their fitness journey. These come in the form of trackers packaged in both hardware and software.

Let’s take Samsung, for example. The tech giant came up with Samsung Health (previously known as S Health) in 2012, which was installed with the Galaxy S3 and has since improved on its features by focusing on recording and analysing fitness data.

You can easily set up your goals for your dream body, count how many steps and kilometres you’ve walked or run and receive advice about nutrition. Apple has also done the same thanks to its health app.

Once you’ve got these installed, you can link it with your Apple Watch or your Fitbit. The moment you sync the devices, it becomes easier for you to gather information.

But let’s dive a little into the tech – how do they really assist you? Easy.

Fitbits, for example, are smartwatches that “motivate you to reach your health and fitness goals by tracking your activity, exercise, sleep, weight”. But these babies can get quite costly, ranging from close to N$3 000 and more at stores such as NanoDog or Cape Union Mart.

Got an iPhone? You may want to try the Apple Watch. These sleek devices include a heart sensor to check your heart rate (and trigger an emergency call if it figures you’re having a heart attack) and follows your daily movements consistently. The ‘move’, ‘exercise’, and ‘stand’ features measure your calories and your activities and forces you to get up when you’ve been sitting for too long.

If you’re tired of your sports band on your watch, add some cool additions as there are plenty to choose from. Who knows, it could even match your fitness outfit of the day!

One of the most popular apps you can get right now is the Nike+ Run Club, an app that includes GPS tracking, audio guided runs, interesting challenges and coaching plans which are customised for you. Other apps you might want to consider include ‘Freeletics’, ‘Fit’, ‘Aaptiv’, ‘Workout For Women’, and plenty others.

These apps are available on both Android and iOS.

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